Plessy v. Ferguson

This was a court case before Brown v. Board of Education, but was still a very important part in Brown v. Board of Education. Homer Plessy, who was only one eighth black, sat in the white section of a train. However, the people that worked on the train still classified him as an African American. They told him to go to the next section, the blacks only section, but he refused. They arrested him and he was taken to court soon after. Plessy argued that the thirteenth and the fourteenth amendments protected him. However, a different judge than the one Oliver Brown would face was in court then, and ruled in favor of Ferguson. Homer went to two more courts, but, sadly, they turned him down too. The final court that had turned him down, the Supreme Court, had seen what this case had shined the light on. African Americans were living in worse conditions than white people. Homer Plessy did not win the case, but it took colored people a step forward. The court decided that from then on, separate would be equal and both white people and black people could live in the same conditions without mixing.